Leonid Fedun, the vice president of oil company Lukoil has said that Russia joining OPEC would enable the cartel to dictate the price of oil and return to fixed contract prices.
“We could define the price precisely. We could decide that tomorrow the oil price would be US$100 per barrel. Unfortunately, Russia’s political leaders did not go this route,” he is quoted as saying by the Russian Kommersant newspaper.
“Russia should join OPEC and move to direct contracts. Then we will jointly control 51 per cent of world output and we can dictate the price by directive,” he added.
However, Russia’s relationship with OPEC has not been that harmonious over the past few months due to the country benefiting from increased oil prices brought about by the 12-nation cartel’s production cuts without actually making any cuts themselves.
If Russia was to join OPEC it would mean that the cartel’s oil production would account for 51% of the world supply. Currently the figure stands at around 40%.
However, the head of Lukoil, Vagit Alekperov, was quoted earlier this month as saying that “Russia would not be joining OPEC anytime in the near future”.
